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Paper short abstract

This research on Nuru Sadiki, a Tanzanian hunter and radio storyteller explores how he uses the sound of a dog's harness to create an appealing performance, listeners' dogs react, revealing how technology can amplify the power of oral narrative.

Paper long abstract

In this paper, I explore the mediatization of folk narrative through a community radio program in my home region of Bukoba, Tanzania. As a folklorist studying far from home, I tune in every Sunday to Kasibante FM, listening to local storytellers on the Asili Yetu (Our Roots), the show that runs in Haya language. My research focuses on one performer, Nuru Sadiki, a hunter who narrates through song and verse. When he comes to the studio, he brings his dog’s metal harness, and its distinctive jingling sound has become central to his performance. This practice caught my attention when listeners began calling in to share a curious phenomenon: their own dogs at home were reacting to the sound, barking and running toward the radio. This response prompted my central research question, “How can a mediated performance feel so closer to authentic?” Drawing on Richard Bauman’s performance theory (1977), I argue that Sadiki uses the harness to “key” his performance, transforming the radio studio into a virtual forest soundscape, an acoustic frame that creates a powerful sensory connection with his audience. My analysis of these broadcasts demonstrates how radio, as a medium of Walter Ong’s “secondary orality” (1982), does not diminish the narrative’s texture. Instead, by removing the visual, radio heightens the audience's imaginative co-performance, proving that technology can be a powerful and unexpectedly "natural" conduit for the ongoing life of folklore.